Nerve Root Injection

Your spinal cord contains several groups of nerves. If something irritates or squeezes these nerves, you may feel pain, weakness or numbness in your arms, hands, legs or feet. To provide relief, your doctor may give you a nerve root injection to block pain signals from triggering discomfort.

Experts at Summit Orthopedics in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area use nerve root injections to provide pain relief for a wide range of spine conditions.

What Are Nerve Root Injections?

Nerve root injections are a treatment used to help relieve pain caused by irritation or inflammation of a spinal nerve root. They involve injecting medicine, typically a steroid and a numbing agent, near the affected nerve where it exits the spine. This reduces swelling and calms the nerve, often providing relief from conditions like herniated discs, sciatica or spinal stenosis. The procedure can also help doctors confirm which nerve is causing the pain.

Nerve root injections are also called nerve blocks.

Benefits

One of the main benefits of nerve root injections is that they relieve chronic pain. In addition, they:

Allow you to find pain relief without surgery
Can be performed as an outpatient procedure, so you go home the same day

Types of Nerve Root Injections

Doctors use nerve root injections to diagnose and treat nerve-related problems. The type used also depends on your specific symptoms.

Selective Nerve Root Block (SNRB)

This type of injection helps doctors find out if a specific nerve is causing your pain. During an SNRB, your doctor puts a numbing medication around a suspected nerve root to temporarily block its function. The medication may cause temporary numbness, tingling or mild weakness in your leg. This helps confirm whether that specific nerve is causing your symptoms.

Transforaminal Epidural Steroid Injection (TFESI)

The main goal of this nerve block procedure is to relieve pain. Your doctor injects a corticosteroid and a small amount of numbing medication around the affected nerve.

Who Needs a Nerve Root Injection?

You may need a nerve root injection if your doctor diagnoses you with cervical radiculopathy or lumbar radiculopathy. You may also need this procedure if you have the following symptoms and your doctor wants to find out what’s causing them:

Chronic low back pain
Numbness in your fingers, hand, leg or feet
Tingling
Weakness

What to Expect

Before the injection, your care team will give you a numbing medication so you don’t feel any pain. Your doctor will then use a special type of X-ray called fluoroscopy to find your nerve root. A small amount of contrast dye will be injected first to make sure the medication will go to the correct place. Once the location is confirmed, the medication is injected.

It’s normal to feel pressure in your neck or arm during the injection, but this feeling typically goes away quickly.

The procedure takes about 15 minutes, but you should plan to be at the center for at least one hour for preparation and recovery.

Risks of Nerve Blocks

The risks of nerve root injections are minimal and similar to any procedure involving a needle injection. These include, but are not limited to:

Allergic reaction to the anesthetic or contrast dye
Bleeding
Infection
Injury to a blood vessel
Irritation of the injected area, which could cause temporary worsening pain
Temporary facial flushing, insomnia or headaches due to steroid exposure
High blood sugar and blood pressure that last several days due to steroid exposure

Recovering After Nerve Root Injection

After the injection, you’ll rest in a recovery area for about five to 10 minutes. Once you’re home, only do light activities. Try not to exert yourself too hard on the first day.

You may feel sore where the needle was inserted for about one to two days. If you received numbing medicine, your arm might feel numb for a few hours. For any discomfort, you can apply ice packs to the injection site for 15 minutes at a time, several times a day.

You shouldn’t soak in a bathtub or pool until 24 hours after the procedure, but it’s fine to take showers.

It’s important to watch for signs of infection or unusual symptoms and let our office know right away if you experience any of these potential (but unlikely) nerve block side effects:

Chills, night sweats or a fever over 100 F
Redness and warmth around where you got the injection
Pain that gets worse
Swelling or any fluid draining from the injection site